Then, thick plumes of bizarre black smoke soared into the sky, instantly enveloping the Chen Family's ancestral home.

"Ah!"

"Ah!"

"Don't kill me!"

Within the black smoke, the tormented cries of the Chen Clan villagers echoed to the heavens.

"This black smoke… it's the Curse Fog!"

"Run for your lives!"

"Run for it!"

Amidst the dark haze, the cultivators of the Chen village scrambled to escape.

"Hehe! Hehehe!"

At that moment, hundreds of meters above the Chen Family's ancestral estate, several Golden Core Peak Cultivators erupted in malevolent laughter.

"Chen Zheng! Your backer is gone! Who can you rely on now? So what if the Chen Family's old ancestor is revived? He's a figure from tens of millions of years ago! Even if he were alive today, he couldn't save you! Chen Zheng, just you wait! After I've exterminated the entire Chen Clan, this old man will take great pleasure in torturing you, extracting your soul to refine into a puppet! Gyeheheh!" the purple-robed cultivator cackled.

"Hmph!"

However, Chen Zheng merely let out a cold snort.

BOOM!

He raised his right hand and, from a distance, casually pressed down toward the purple-robed cultivator and his cohort.

"What!"

"Damn it!"

"I can't block it!"

The purple-robed cultivator, the other Golden Core Peak Cultivator, and the two remaining early-stage Nascent Soul cultivators cried out in despair as their physical bodies and divine souls were completely annihilated.

RUMBLE!

RUMBLE!

RUMBLE!

Just then, the blood-red fog above the Chen Family's ancestral tomb began to churn, forming a vortex. An evil aura pulsed out from within it.

"Gyeheheh! Gyeheheh! My master has arrived! Chen Clan! I've come to collect a debt! Every single bastard of the Chen bloodline must die!" a deep voice boomed from the darkness.

WHOOSH!

From the blood-red vortex, a monstrous head emerged.

"Who are you?" Chen Zheng asked nonchalantly.

"Who am I? An old friend, of course! I am an avatar of your father, Chen Zheng! Chen Zheng! You accursed spawn, you caused me to suffer endless torture! Today, I've come to settle the score. Not only will I annihilate your entire Chen Family, but I won't spare your wife, your children, or any of your elders! Haha! Your clansmen, your women, your descendants, your relatives and friends—all of them will be enslaved by me! Gyeheheh!" the head cackled madly.

WHOOSH!

As it spoke, the head lunged from the vortex, shooting straight for Chen Zheng. In the blink of an eye, its hideous, blood-mouthed maw snapped at him.

"You overestimate yourself."

Chen Zheng glanced at the gaping mouth, then lifted his right foot and stomped down on the monstrous head.

POW!

The head shuddered, then instantly exploded.

THUD!

The monstrous head fell to the ground, a single drop of crimson blood splattering on the soil.

SWISH!

The villagers witnessed this scene and stood frozen in a stupor.

"Chen Zheng! You dare injure me!" a furious roar echoed as the monstrous head reassembled itself.

"Hmph!"

Without a second glance, Chen Zheng snorted coldly, raised his hand, and slapped out again.

CRACK!

The monstrous head shattered into pieces.

"No!"

"You deserve to die! You deserve to die!"

Two shrill screams erupted from within the fragments of the head.

BOOM!

A shower of blood sprayed out as the monstrous head completely disintegrated.

"You… you actually… killed that thing!"

"That thing… it had to be an Ancient Demon, right?"

The purple-robed cultivator and the three mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivators trembled with fear, their faces etched with absolute shock as they stared at Chen Zheng.

"I thought you all were powerful, but it turns out you're just a bunch of trash," Chen Zheng said indifferently. He reached out and plucked a Crystal Core from the remnants of the head. As it settled into his palm, a dense, evil aura emanated from it, causing his soul to quiver slightly as if it had encountered something exciting.

RUMBLE!

RUMBLE!

At that instant, the Chen Family's ancestral tomb began to tremble violently.

"Hmm?"

The purple-robed cultivator and the others watched in confusion as the tomb shook. Suddenly, with a WHOOSH, countless blood-red chains shot out from the tomb, ensnaring Chen Zheng.

"What are those!"

"Those blood-red chains! They look like they're… made from that creature's bones! In life, that thing must have been at the Tribulation level!"

"Chen Zheng is done for!"

A commotion broke out among the onlooking cultivators. Before their astonished eyes, Chen Zheng simply took a step forward and strode directly into the Chen Family's ancestral tomb. The purple-robed cultivator and his companions tried to follow, but they were blocked by an invisible barrier.

CLANG!

CLANG!

Inside the Chen Family's ancestral home, Chen Zheng walked across a network of iron chains. Every few feet, he passed a desiccated corpse. Each corpse had a pair of crimson eyes that swiveled to track his movement, as if they were on the verge of coming back to life.

"What… what is going on!"

"Is there some ferocious beast or terrifying entity hidden in this ancestral home?"

"Did our ancestors bury a fiendish beast or a cursed object here? Are they sealed beneath the ancestral home?"

The villagers were terrified, backing away again and again. Even knowing that Chen Zheng was no ordinary man, none of them dared to take a single step closer to the ancestral home.

CLANG! CLANG!

Suddenly, the rattling of chains echoed from within the house, followed immediately by a cacophony of heart-rending wails.

"Waaah! Mom, Dad, where are you! Grandpa, Grandma, where are you!"

"Waaah! Big Brother, Sister-in-law, it's me, your little brother! It hurts so much!"

"Grandpa! Grandma! I beg you, show your spirits and protect me!"

"Aah! Mommy! Mommy, save me! Daddy, save me!"

Cries, shouts, and pleas for help mingled into a single, ear-piercing shriek.

"Chen Zheng! You scourge! You monster! This is the sin of your Chen Family! You, you scourge, must pay for it with your life!" the purple-robed cultivator cursed furiously as he flashed forward to attack Chen Zheng.

"Get lost," Chen Zheng said coldly.

CLANG!

The purple-robed cultivator's body went stiff and he crashed to the ground.

"You…"

"That little brat Chen Zheng is too tyrannical!"

"How can this outcast from the Chen Family be so powerful!"

While the villagers were still in shock, the iron chains whipped out and bound three Golden Core Peak Cultivators. Then, enormous mouths opened up out of nowhere and devoured the three cultivators completely.

CRUNCH!

SNAP!

The sounds of chewing filled the air.

GULP!

"That… That's the scion of the Chen Family eating people!"

"Heavens!"

The villagers were petrified.

At that moment, outside the Chen Family's ancestral home, besides the villagers and the cultivators standing behind them, only Chen Lin remained.

"Young lass Lin! That brat must be that wretch, Chen Zheng! He lured you here on purpose! He wants to eat you too! Run, quickly!" the purple-robed cultivator shouted, having regained his senses.

"Run? Why should I run?" A strange smile bloomed on Chen Lin's face.

"You… what's wrong with you? Your face is getting paler and paler!" The purple-robed cultivator frowned, studying Chen Lin closely. His eyes suddenly widened in shock. His senses told him that the Yin Sha energy inside her body was surging violently.

"This… Chen Lin doesn't have much time left! Her life force is draining away! At this rate, she has twenty years at most!" a nearby green-robed, mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivator cried out after a quick scan. Hearing this, the expressions of the other two changed drastically.

Life force! It really was her life force! Chen Lin's life force was fading!

"This is bad! That wretch Chen Zheng is devouring young Lin's life force! These vile scions of the Chen Family really did collude with Chen Zheng! We suspected this was a possibility! The Chen Family's descendants are truly vicious, using their own daughter as a sacrificial offering!" The purple-robed cultivator took a deep breath, suppressing the demonic impulses stirring within him.

"Heheh! We've been trapped in this ancestral tomb for so long that we're no longer purely members of the Chen Family. In that case, we have no more scruples. We can use our forbidden arts without restraint to raise our cultivation realms!"

"Right!"

"We have to survive!"

As soon as the purple-robed cultivator finished speaking, the three others grunted in agreement.

BOOM!

BOOM!

BOOM!

In an instant, three terrifying auras erupted. Their power flared, climbing through the levels of Golden Core: early-stage, mid-stage, late-stage, and finally, peak!

"AARGH!"

But no sooner had these four terrifying auras manifested than they vanished completely.

HISS!

The purple-robed cultivator and his three companions instinctively stumbled back.

What the hell! What just happened?

Their secret arts were gone! Just a moment ago, they had felt a magnificent, surging power. Why did it disappear in an instant? What's more, the cultivation they had spent centuries building had also vanished!

"Impossible!"

"Why is my cultivation, which I spent hundreds of years to build, suddenly gone? What is this demonic thing? Why do I feel so empty inside? My life force is gone too… I'm just a withered old man now!"

"How could this happen? Where did my life force go?"

The villagers were completely bewildered.

"There was once an old man here named Chen Zheng. All of this is connected to him," the purple-robed cultivator mused, his gaze turning toward the young man in the ancestral home. "Inside the Chen Family's ancestral home, a powerful restriction left by a Chen ancestor lies dormant. Though that Chen Zheng has been dead for centuries, he left a ward on this place. Normally, it would never be triggered, but no one could have predicted that an outsider would barge in here today!"

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